 Hey everybody so as she said my name is Rebecca I work at Red Hat. I am a program manager to think about how do we scale the open aspects of our culture so the pieces of our culture that are very much inspired by open source rooted in open source ethos how do we scale those things and so here today to talk about a very popular topic inside Red Hat and outside which is if you have a lot of opinions and you have people who feel very free to speak up how do you ever make a decision that sticks and not just endlessly debate and revisit your decisions and so I don't have all the answers for you I certainly don't have all the answers in 25 minutes but we can at least get to the beginning of where things might lead. If you have questions just raise your hand and I will take them in the middle. Alright so I'm going to start with a question of my own. When have you seen debate be valuable and helpful or on the other side when is it not so helpful? So you find it helpful when you're trying to decide as assisted men what are you going to use? Which products we use? Gotcha and so why is it helpful? So you get to learn about things you might not have thought of on your own pros and cons. I saw a hand go up over here. At the beginning it's very helpful probably because you don't know the answer yet right in the back. So when the debate is well framed it could be quite useful anything else? So useful in challenging your own thinking and potentially changing someone else's opinion. Alright when is it not so helpful? So after the decision has been made debate less helpful. Yeah when it never ends yeah why why does it never end? Sometimes because people aren't listening or they just aren't going to agree right? When else? When people are arguing just because they enjoy arguing sometimes. There's no reason why somebody would be just like Cameron pointed out even when there's so much logic against his arguments and he's still in the system making the same arguments over again. Alright I won't even try to rephrase that I think we all understand that one. Go ahead. So when the person who is kind of supposed to do something with this debate gets sort of stuck and doesn't know what to do. Yeah it kind of frees up or they don't ever make a decision or just shut down. Gotcha so they're not so great sometimes at moving toward alignment on some kind of decision. Alright anything else you want to throw out there? So when we decide we're going to keep just rehashing the same argument I made my argument no one agrees so I'll just say the same argument again. Got it. Alright lots of good things to think about as we talk about this. Alright so now I want you to think about a time when there was one of those endless arguments, endless debates, and you knew I probably should drop this now but you didn't. For whatever reason you just kept bringing it up even though you had that feeling I should stop now. You just kept bringing it up. Anybody ever done this? Okay why? You knew you were right. Okay what about up here? I didn't know how to stop. I didn't know how to move forward without continuing to argue. Why else? I was attached to one particular outcome and I felt that was the right right way to go. Got you. Anything else? The answer is obvious and they're not getting it. Yeah so I want you to hold on to that. Has anybody never had the experience where you felt like you wanted to just keep arguing when you shouldn't? Is this a pretty universal experience we've all been there at some point? So so in the end. Alright well good for you we should learn from you. So the rest of you I want you to hold on to that feeling that you had and remember what that felt like because that is actually really really useful when it's your decision that you're trying to make stick and you're struggling with someone who's in that space right. If you can remember what motivated you in that moment to keep arguing it helps a lot with how you handle it. Alright common causes go ahead. How can you get rid of it? So the question was how can you get rid of the recurring debates? Don't work with humans. But there are ways right but universally speaking that impulse to keep pushing it will always be there. There are however that's what we're gonna talk about. Some ways you can I would say sidestep maybe 80%. 100% I can't give you but 80% we can probably do. We'll get into it. Alright so I do want to talk about what are some of those common causes? I don't feel heard right. If I don't feel that you're listening like you're hearing but you're not listening I'm probably gonna feel that impulse to keep pushing. I don't feel valued. So you listen to me but yet for whatever reason you're not valuing what I'm saying. So if I'm telling you I'm impacted and you're saying I'm moving forward I might be hearing that as your opinion doesn't matter to me. The impact this has on you doesn't matter to me. Maybe I don't trust your intentions as a decision maker right. Many times we continue to push because we think I think there's some reason for this decision that I don't agree with or you say this is the reason why you're making I'm not sure I believe you right that's a very strong driver. Maybe I'm just bringing this up because I didn't know someone made a decision right new people join communities every day join projects I might be bringing up something that's been brought up many times before and have no idea that it's been talked about. Maybe I can't make sense of the decision right we heard a lot of that in the back today. Maybe the decision you made just doesn't make sense to me. Maybe I just dislike the decision I disagree with it right that's a common reason. Maybe you and I have competing or conflicting interests so maybe what is most important to you is not what is most important to me that's going to be hard for us to come to an agreement and move on. Maybe my goal here is to overturn the decision or to make you revisit it so that's why I keep bringing it up right and maybe I just enjoy arguing for argument's sake and I think what's funny about this one is when I ask people why do you think this person keeps bringing the same thing up they always start there I think they just like to argue right but when I ask people in a room you know that time when you kept pushing why was it no one ever says that I'm not saying there's nobody out there who doesn't just enjoy arguing for arguing's sake but they won't admit it so you might as well give up on that one all right we covered it pretty well there reasons why this might happen anything else you would add to the list yeah so I might be missing some key piece of information either I didn't understand it or I totally missed the reason why that makes sense yes okay so let's kind of we'll come back to this in a bit but what I would pause it to you is there is a way of approaching decisions that will help you sidestep a good 80% of this it's not going to get you to a hundred percent but most people if you approach decisions in a certain way you can keep them out of this space entirely you know why my buttons are backwards there we go so how do you make decisions that stick right the argument I would make to you is follow a predictable process one that's designed to prevent those kinds of causes of recurring disagreement we at Red Hat have a much longer version of this that's called the open decision framework it's sort of our set of best practices you can find it on github and remix it to your heart's content make it work for you but what I'm going to give you today is sort of the streamlined everyday decision version of this so at the heart of it what are we talking about when we say follow a predictable process so I'm going to walk you through step by step four steps what does that process look like and I'm going to show you in the real world what does it look like to actually do this so step one think and draft what are the details about this decision and what would your ideal decision making process for it look like right so what is the decision you're trying to make frame up that what is the problem you're trying to solve here when do you need to make this decision how do you think it's the right way to go about making it right if you're going to think about who is going to be responsible how is it going to look who might be impacted by it who might care right so do some thinking up front who gets a voice who gets a vote because those aren't always the same thing right how are you going to go about getting their input who is the ultimate decision-maker going to be and why should that person be the ultimate decision-maker and if it's not a one person okay maybe have some other way of doing it what's your forcing function if it comes down to two people and they disagree then what so you want to know kind of what does that path forward look like in my mind what's the ideal state what are the known constraints the known requirements going into this so you kind of just framing up the problem and framing up the process up front in your own head and it makes sense to put it down on paper because you're going to want to share it with other people step one all right step two call for comments so this is when you're going to take what you just put together just hopefully not terribly long and you're going to say hey here are the details about the decision and the process I think makes sense to follow let's have a discussion about it let's debate this stuff right up front right so it's time boxed you want to invite a time boxed discussion and debate about all of these factors why up front why open the floor to debating these things before you're talking about the decision itself right for most people if they understand at the beginning here's what the process is they don't so much go back and try to pick apart the process later on why else yeah so what was said was for many people at least giving that chance up front to provide to ask questions or give comments gives that puts it out there in the open and people don't necessarily feel like they have to go back later on and do it again did I say that right other questions comments all right like I said 80% the 20% we'll get to all right so your goal in this is to make it safe for everybody to disagree to question and to alert you to mistakes right because early on we may think I know it makes sense I know who should make this decision I know how it should be done I know what the constraints are it's very tempting to move forward at that stage and just say great here's the decision take a minute to just entertain the possibility we might be missing something right we might not know everything and I get this question a lot from people they say if I already know what the right answer is and it's up to me to make the decision why shouldn't I just make it and my answer to that is well I can't answer that question for you and some types of decisions maybe you should but the answer I would give you if you ask me if you think you know the right answer why don't you just say it and be done is I've been wrong before so just a moment up front to consider that possibility might save me a whole lot of headache later on so you could use it in that circumstance you might frame the conversation a little differently right most of the time we kind of have a hunch at least of what the options are but sometimes it is very open-ended and then maybe it's more of a brainstorming conversation and at this stage the other thing I will say to is listen far more than you respond so you will get a lot of questions but many times those questions are really more like objections in the form of a question or you might get a lot of instant feedback that way I don't like any of this I don't know about any of this so it's very tempting to just jump in and defend here's where I thought I was coming from just pause for a moment and let that conversation happen right if you need to clarify something sure go ahead jump in and do it but it's okay to just take some time to absorb what is the reaction that's coming in and if you listen in that moment you might find rather than just responding if you listen you might find that you learn something new that shifts your perspective it's very tempting early on to feel real attached to I'm pretty sure I knew where this was going just withhold judgment for a little bit all right so real world how does it look maybe it's an email call for comments changes to blog and food as maintainer of blog and food I want to give you all a heads up about a decision some decisions I'm making that may impact your workflow I'm planning to do these things for these reasons these individuals or groups could be impacted in these ways I'm unaware of any other impact so please respond by this date if there's something or somebody that I'm missing based on what I hear from everybody between now and then explain the process right I'm gonna make the decision I'm gonna put it up for a vote by these individuals so on and so forth disagree with my approach let's talk soon as possible thanks blog and food maintainer all right step three revise the process because inevitably most of the time you're gonna learn something from that conversation that's gonna make you go oh wait a second the way I thought we should approach this decision it's off a little somewhere that's a good time to kind of come back and say okay quick publishing of I said this was the process here's what the actual process is gonna be and why clarify what are those details about the decision that you saw questions about or misunderstandings miss misinterpretations clarify that stuff and highlight when you're making changes to the process based on what you heard highlight that you're doing that I'll show you in a minute what that looks like also you are gonna get inevitably some feedback about the process or the decision details that you're not gonna act on so it's also time to acknowledge that and explain why here's what that looks like all right revised call for comments changes to blog and food thanks for the input a few changes to the decision process based on what I heard one it makes sense to move forward with one of the decisions only if these three individuals all vote yes that's because reasons two for the other decisions I'm gonna make the decision as maintainer because reasons there was a request for community vote which I declined on list for reasons somebody helpful pointed out downstream project that's gonna be greatly impacted so I'm extending the call for comments by this period of time to get their input I'm sending a final announcement on March 2nd regarding these decisions and the implementation timing thanks right straightforward doesn't have to be terribly complicated but everybody understands where you are where you're headed changes made and why also they at least hear that you heard the request to open this up for a democratic vote all right fourth and last step publish the decision so you spend a lot of time up front getting the details in shape getting the process set people understand where you're going listening now it's time to kind of close this out so you're gonna recap what was the process that you got here by you are going to identify what are your conditions or timeline for revisiting sometimes that's necessary so what it looks like decisions reached changes to blog and food hi everybody thanks for your input and discussion here's where everything landed the three individuals all voted yes on moving forward with one of the decisions they cited these reasons as key factors this is going to happen on or about this date we heard specific concerns and thus are going to revisit that decision when or under what conditions right this is a nice way of dealing with the feedback that it's not really going to shift it but maybe right worst case scenario will revisit for the other decision I decided to do these specific things you're going to see these changes implemented around about this time frame there was some concern from a couple individuals about this one thing which is why I'm going to do this I also heard this concern over here but ultimately I had to make a judgment call hopefully we can reduce that risk by doing this thing over here if you see questions about these decisions in the future please refer people back to this thread for context right so in that last little bit I'm already a little bit preemptively saying decision has been made and if people have questions come back here first that helps quite a bit you're going to get some help from some of your friends hopefully alright so 80% most of the time if I do a good job of the listening that's going to settle most of it right I've taken into account people's feedback give them a chance they know where it's headed feel like they had their opportunity 20% the debate will probably rage on and I will say some people just take time right to kind of grapple with I voice the opinion it was not received as fact and now we have to move on so if the debate continues in the immediate aftermath great you don't have to engage necessarily you've said what needs to be said let them have their say for a minute or a week or a month move on make decision however sometimes it just goes on for a long long time right and you get a sense after a while if you're somebody who makes decisions you kind of get a feel for is this one going to fade out or not is it going to keep coming up if it keeps coming up that's a good time to play detective so come back to why might they be doing this because what you do in response is probably going to depend a lot on the motivation of the person who's bringing up or the group of people I can't tell you the exact answer to that right it's a case-by-case kind of thing but understanding what's behind what they're saying matters a lot what are some ways you can figure out why are they doing this ask them and then ask again and ask a third time right because usually it takes about three times to get to the real reason what else what was that the five why is right why why why why that's why I say ask them again and ask them a third time maybe it's five keep asking yeah you can also look at the words they're using sometimes it's in the words somewhere but often the words are kind of a mask and you have to go deeper so you can ask specifically you keep bringing this up is it because you feel like I'm not listening no it's because blah blah right so I right away if I offer a pretty neutral reason why they're gonna correct me even if I get it wrong and if I guess right okay great we can start to have a conversation about it I can usually turn the tide on the 15 of that 20 right so if I've got 20% left 15% or so with some one-on-one conversations and just being genuinely curious as to why do you keep bringing this up we can get to a place we're okay we might need to agree to disagree I might need to rethink something but we can probably settle things down the last 5% we're not going to cover in 20 minutes but you know we can have a hallway conversation about how many minutes do we have left by the way five to go all right what questions do you have three at once okay I'm gonna go all the way in the back first good question so the question was we talked a lot about from the perspective of the decision-maker and the reverse side of that is what is expected of a participant in a process I think it's a good question I suppose that my answer to that would depend on who I'm talking to so if I'm talking to you as an individual participant I would say play nice right so you know if somebody is inviting you to be heard and they're inviting you to sway their decision in some way try to be reasonable in that process if you feel like they're just really not listening voice that you know you can say I feel like you've asked for my opinion but I'm getting these signs that indicate maybe you're not actually interested in what I have to say show me where I'm wrong right help me understand so that is one piece that's helpful if I'm in more of a role where I'm responsible for kind of how is the community as a whole interacting and behaving then I might take a different approach right I might say you know my responsibility might be to kind of bring the community up a level when I see hey the behavior that's happening here is not real helpful I might talk about you know we really can only create things together if we all work together well and you know if it seems like you're just picking apart every decision anybody's trying to make that's not a real helpful behavior let's talk about what's a more productive way to participate in this so it kind of depend on who I'm talking to what would you add I'm trying to rephrase that further recording so what Diane said was one concern she has is how do you make sure that all the right people are invited to participate and it certainly is a challenge the larger a project is larger organization is you don't necessarily want to blast everybody about everything because at some point it becomes hard for anybody to find anything that's relevant to them but that's where that question up front of who would be impacted who might care can be really helpful and I think a really good way to get past your own limitations of who you're aware of is to ask that same question early on of everybody who is aware right so who else might care who else might be impacted I don't know about and being flexible enough to extend your timing a little bit where needed to make sure that you reach out to those people because if you just ignore groups of people who have an opinion you're just gonna it's gonna be more time later right you don't you never really get to make that time up it comes back to haunt you I saw a question over here but you have to do something with team yeah so that question was about bad actors have you ever been in a situation where you had a decision-maker who was really making a decision that was best for themselves or their own group but not best for the whole yes I don't know that any of us have not I will say that's probably a hallway conversation as it would take me more than two minutes but the biggest thing I think you can do is try to find what is the shared purpose that you and they both share and hold that up for them ask them you know it seems like the decision you're making is great for this group here I also know you care about the broader community I'm having a hard time reconciling what I'm seeing here right open it approach with curiosity and you might have some luck think we're out of time thank you all very much I'll be outside if you want to talk